Unfortunately, even with a freshly rebooted iPhone RDM+ crashes Safari fairly regularly--to the point I can't really do much of anything on a 1680x1050 desktop (and this is via WiFi).

RDM+ needs several things in order to make me want to use it regularly:

1.) Compression. See the screenshots I've posted of VNC. It uses compression to speed things up, and I think RDM+ needs to as well (this requires an update to the desktop component, obviously).

2.) Window support. No doubt about it, to me this feature is going to be required. Again, see the VNC screenshots.

3.) Speed. Along with compression and windows support, which both will increase speed, the overall response of RDM+ is slow. For example, at this time--on my PC--using the keyboard is excruciatingly slow (when I can use it, Safari usually crashes before I can type more than a few characters). moreover, the tapped-here pop-up takes too long to appear, IMO (even over WiFi).

For reference I have used--so far--the following remote solutions with the iPhone (probably will write a review at some point):

VNC: Works great if I am right by the PC. Window mode is fast. But as it doesn't run as a service (the version I am using) I can't get to my PC when the desktop is locked. Also, the desktop counterpart crashes, which wouldn't be fun if it happened when trying to remote in (assuming the desktop is unlocked). Not a workable solution for the masses, as they aren't about to get into port forwarding and whatnot. On a good note it is free.

LogMeIn: Works sorta OK via WiFi, and is free (for the free version, obviously). Works via EDGE but the "repaint the whole window" behavior makes it quite slow. Does have keyboard support but it is weak. No windows mode: full-screen only. No "virtual mouse;" when you tap on the iPhone it is interpreted as a mouse click on the remote PC. Doesn't crash much. GoToMyPC shows promise (assuming they better-support iPhones).

GoToMyPC: Universal Viewer requires java. 'Nuff said.

RDM+: See my comments above. In a nutshell it isn't usable right now, at least with my 1680x1050 desktop PC. It's too slow and crashes Safari religiously. But it is beta and I hope it gets better with time.

Genius

Well, now that I have been able to compare both WINVNC and RDM+ I am give my comparison of the 2.
WINVNC- Ok, I had a bit of trouble getting connected outside of my network, but now that Tinman (Mike) has shown me the way to configure the port, it's up and running. It's a little unstable. I get crashes every other time I use it, or anything longer than a 15 minute connection time. The "click" menu is very detailed, with many options, and over Edge, it's actually fairly fast.
RDM+ is also a good program with a strong representation for security. The "click" menu is a bit slower than the VNC and has fewer options, but does carry the essentials of single and double left clicks, Text, and a sub menu where you can access the CTRL+ALT+DEL if needed.
Overall, here's what it boils down to:
WINVNC ( TightVNC) fast On either Edge or WiFi! lots of click options, Crashes occasionally on me, not what I call stable at this point.
RDM+ Very secure!, a little slow, clicks are also a bit slow. An example would be that I was in the task Manager and was trying to sort the processes by name. I clicked on the "Name" header and then clicked the double click. Nothing happened for almost 2 minutes. This is over an Edge connection, and the PC is on Broadband.

I'm going to keep testing and watch to see how the 2 programs progress. I'll keep updating here and let you know how it goes.

Victoria,
If you want, I can email you my updates as well if it's easier for you and your team.

New Member

RDM+ needs several things in order to make me want to use it regularly:

1.) Compression. ...

2.) Window support. ...

3.) Speed. Along with compression and windows support, which both will increase speed, the overall response of RDM+ is slow. For example, at this time--on my PC--using the keyboard is excruciatingly slow (when I can use it, Safari usually crashes before I can type more than a few characters). moreover, the tapped-here pop-up takes too long to appear, IMO (even over WiFi).

Mike, thanks you.
RDM+ uses png-like compression. Did you compare RDM+ and VNC speed not on local network?
Window support will be realized, but not in current release.
Did you test RDM+ text input on the iPhone, or only on your PC?

New Member

I tried the program and it seemed to install and set up quite easily. Its not very practical, though. It takes centuries to just click the cursor. You can't really do anything. Good idea. I hope you can get it to a useable state.

Genius

I am still testing, but the speed difference bwtween the RDM+ and WINVNC is really night and day.
I think the reason might be because the VNC connection is straight to your PC, while the RDM+ goes through a server ( If I understand the service correctly) which means that there is an extra "hop" before the signal is received from either side. If there were a way to speed the process up and add all the functionality that the VNC client has, then this would be a top-notch program, no doubt. But at this point in the beta phaze, it's just too slow to be practical.
To give you an idea, I have a PC cam on at my apartment, and I can use VNC to remote in and view everything real-time with only an average of 1-2 seconds between each screen refresh. It's more like 10-15-20 seconds through theRDM+ client.

Evangelist

Mike, thanks you.
RDM+ uses png-like compression. Did you compare RDM+ and VNC speed not on local network?
Window support will be realized, but not in current release.
Did you test RDM+ text input on the iPhone, or only on your PC?

Sorry, I wasn't clear in that comment. I tried text input on the iPhone. When I wrote "on my PC" I should have written: remoting into my PC. The reason I mentioned that is because of the desktop resolution of 1680x1050. To me that is typical in this day and age, but I wanted to mention it nonetheless.

As far as the png-like compression, it ain't workin' too well for me--the speed is just not there. See the screenshot I posted from a VNC session. That appears to use jpg-like compression that, while lossy (compared to lossless in png), is quite acceptable to me (I need speed more than beauty).

Window support will help greatly even with lossless compression (though I still think you need to have lossy compression available--it's really needed on the iPhone).

The other big issue of course is Safari crashing. I have a hunch that would go down when you implement windows functionality, and lossy compression (i.e., I think in its current form RDM+ is too data-intensive for Safari to handle).

New Member

As far as the png-like compression, it ain't workin' too well for me--the speed is just not there. See the screenshot I posted from a VNC session. That appears to use jpg-like compression that, while lossy (compared to lossless in png), is quite acceptable to me (I need speed more than beauty).

Window support will help greatly even with lossless compression (though I still think you need to have lossy compression available--it's really needed on the iPhone).

The other big issue of course is Safari crashing. I have a hunch that would go down when you implement windows functionality, and lossy compression (i.e., I think in its current form RDM+ is too data-intensive for Safari to handle).

I can tell you that for me, it's about 5-10 minutes at most. It's hard to tell sometimes. I've had it crash the app on my PC and the window just hung no matter what I did. I had to connect through VNC, restart the app, disconnect from VNC and launch again. The next time it crashed the whole PC. It rebooted before I even know it when down, as I was still looking at an image of my desktop.
My Display is widescreen, 1440 X 900. My PC is a Pentium 4 3Ghz processor, with 3 gigs of RAM. Plenty of power.

Evangelist

I can tell you that for me, it's about 5-10 minutes at most. It's hard to tell sometimes. I've had it crash the app on my PC and the window just hung no matter what I did. I had to connect through VNC, restart the app, disconnect from VNC and launch again. The next time it crashed the whole PC. It rebooted before I even know it when down, as I was still looking at an image of my desktop.
My Display is widescreen, 1440 X 900. My PC is a Pentium 4 3Ghz processor, with 3 gigs of RAM. Plenty of power.

But as for Safari, it's hard to say. Most times I can't get past the Windows login screen as soon as I start typing it crashes. Matter of fact the keyboard seems to be a big trigger when crashing. If I don't use the keyboard Safari seems to crash less (but I can't not use the keyboard).

New Member

Dear Mike, Hawk and OJsakila,
we offer you to test a new version of RDM+ for iPhone which works faster.
It uses jpeg-like compression for the remote desktop viewing.
(Further we are planning to add the opportunity of changing the compression rate.)

Much faster now, Denis. Thanks for the update. Safari did crash on me before the first screen was drawn, but the next time it did not. Didn't use the keyboard, however.

The main thing now is to get window support. Once it has that it will be excellent, IMO.

And to be clear, the "window support" I am referring to may not be as difficult as it seems, at least the way VNC seems to implement it. The VNC desktop merely records the titles of all open windows, and their coordinates on the desktop, and creates a list that is offered during login. When you choose a window to "remote into" all that really happens is that VNC paints/controls the section of the desktop occupied by that window. If I were to move that window around I can still see the desktop behind it.

In other words, if Outlook was open on my desktop with a window size of 800x600, at a starting pixel location of 250:150, VNC would only draw that portion of the desktop, in that exact location. The impact on speed Vs. drawing the entire desktop is huge.

Genius

Denis, I tried the previous version and now the test release. I have an issue that after connecting my iPhone gets a yellow dialog saying Authorized... but then nothing else. On my PC it shows a connection from me in the connections dialog.

Yes, it still does. I am lucky if I can just type in my Windows login password without it crashing. Text input is also quite slow.

Safari still crashes regularly even without text input. Today I needed to access my home PC while at lunch, via EDGE, so figured I would try RDM+. It was essentially an exercise in frustration. After 4 crashes before even getting past the Windows login, I couldn't do much of anything without a crash. I finally gave up.